


The Garden

by Talullah



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-21
Updated: 2014-08-21
Packaged: 2018-02-14 04:19:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2177634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Talullah/pseuds/Talullah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The smell of fresh cut grass always brought back her most painful memory.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Garden

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to slayer9649 for the beta. :)
> 
> Written for the originalficfest challenge. Prompt 11.
> 
> [Disclaimer/Blanket Statement](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Talullah/profile)

How do you tell of an old regret? Stories of past accomplishments glow, golden and clean for everyone to see. The difficulties fade to oblivion or are recounted as magnificent hurdles, which we have heroically transposed. The moments of failure are, however, entirely different, lingering in the dark, palpable as scars, waiting for the right moment to remind us of their existence.

Milena pressed her lips in a bitter line as she watched her handsome gardener preparing the mower. It was a common place, a middle-aged, sex-starved house-wife staring at a tanned, mid-twenties sex-god in overalls, yearning for a touch of spice and colour in a greyed life. Her mind was far from the sculpted body or the promises or wanton pleasures waved at her, though. She squinted at the grey sky, knowing all too well that rain would come soon to finally cool the summer air, but today it would not be a blessing.

She picked up her coffee mug from the porch table and went inside the house. The smell of the fresh-cut grass would penetrate every fringe and find her in the deepest recesses of her home, made more poignant by the rain, and it would take her back to a day far in the past, to her most painful memory.

Milena had spent years reasoning with herself to dull the pain and the guilt. Time had thickened her skin but she was far from indifferent to the echoes of the past. Milena knew that it was not indifference that kept her eyes dry, nor tiredness... perhaps only a very banal inured feeling similar to an old pain. She no longer felt remorse for feeling less than she should; she had learned to accept that dullness as a gift.

The mower started its ugly song of destruction as Milena set her mug in the sink. 'Order from chaos,' she thought, imagining the green whirl of severed grass blades inside the tummy of the monster. She turned back and walked onto the porch. She was too old to run from memories.

* * *

"Millie!!! Millieeee!!!! Come home!"

Millie's ears twitched at her mother's call. She hated that: it was something that cats and dogs did, not humans. She decided to play deaf. Above her a rabbit-cloud prepared to hop on an eagle-cloud and she wanted to see the outcome of their brawl... It was too blue to go in just now, too hot to think of being a good girl and doing some expected chore. She was ten, old enough to know that the dishes from lunch still waited for her attention and she would tend to them soon; there was no need for her mother to shout about it.

"Millie!"

The insistent shouts eroded the girl's resolve. She stood up slowly, the heat defeating her anger, and plodded through the lawn in a zig-zag line to avoid the sun. The garden was the only thing she liked in the house. It was a long strip of semi-wild grass with twenty trees in total. No one she knew had a garden like that, not even Aunt Celeste who lived up the hill in the largest house of the street.

When they had bought the house, her mother had tried to tame the stretch of wilderness by scattering flower cloisters through the lawn and against the fences. She was appalled at the though of doing something as manly as mowing and that had saved the lawn from becoming as pristine and ordered as their home. Millie's father had watched indulgently, playing deaf to his wife's constant pleas for more aggressive mowing, and after three summers her mother had quit her perennial fight against weeds. The flower cloisters had quickly vanished in the calf-high grass and for a while, the garden had disappeared from the dining table conversation.

Then, Millie's mother had tried to convince her husband to cut down the oak and the cherry tree which stood aligned with the back porch. The empty space would be used to build a gazebo. There would be a well-kept lawn around it, some flower pots, maybe a small fountain, creating a place where she would not be ashamed to invite the neighbours. John and the children could have the rest of the wilderness all to themselves. Her father, John, had kept his bland smile, waiting for his wife to forget the idea but Marissa was determined to win the war against the garden, much to her family's chagrin.

The matter had slowly slipped into oblivion until one summer morning, two years before. Millie and her brother, Ryan, lay day-dreaming in the tree house. Ryan was ten and she eight and the summer was perfect. They spent their afternoons playing with their cousin Jimmy and Scruffy, the family's ageing rough collie. Mornings were spent in glorious lazing in the tree house in the back of the garden.

That morning, however, the children were roused by loud, sickening thumps coming from the house. A cold hand clutched Millie's stomach as she climbed down the tree so fast her legs were cut and scratched. Ryan ran ahead but Millie never asked him to wait for her. When she caught up with him, he was asking their mother for explanations as a man wearing a shirt from "Green Joe's" axed down the first victim, the bi-centenary oak.

A tense smile pulled her mother's lips. "Don't shout, Ryan, especially not at your mother and in the company of strangers."

Marissa stood in the porch, impeccable as always in her morning dress and red lipstick. Her composure only wavered when Ryan ran past her into the house, shouting, "I'm going to call dad!"

She tried to grab his arm, but Ryan was too fast.

"Ryan Hammond," she raised her voice. "You come back here immediately."

Ryan slammed the door behind him. Millie tried to follow him, but this time Marissa was ready. She forced her daughter to stay by her side, holding her arms until it hurt and Millie had quieted down.

Millie was shocked that her mother would stoop to something so wrong, so stealthy and cruel, even. It was plain wrong to cut those trees down. But she was more shocked, even, that for the first time, Ryan had disobeyed their mother. He returned from the house and stood by their side, his lips pale and twitching.

"This is wrong and you know it, mother," he accused.

Wordlessly, their mother slapped his face, bringing instant tears to Ryan's eyes. Millie could not recall their parents ever spanking them. She held on to Ryan, waiting for their father to arrive and stop the slaughter.

By the time their father reached home, a second tree was on its way. Silent tears still rolled down Ryan's cheeks and he held Millie too tightly. She knew those tears had nothing to do with the slap their mother had delivered to his face. She could barely look at her mother's face but when she did, she did not find the satisfied smile she had expected. Marissa was pale and trembling.

The day was reserved for vicious surprises, apparently. Millie had never seen her father truly angry but on that day, he had coldly stopped the man in his work of destruction, had paid him and sent him away.

"John," their mother had called, as he entered the house silently. He had not answered.

He sat by the kitchen table, sweat pearling his forehead as he loosened his tie.

"John, this is my house too," Marissa had started in an almost pleading tone while her children stood huddled at the corner. "I have the right-"

"I pay for this house and everything in it." John cut acridly.

Marissa gasped. "I am only tr-"

"I am tired, Marissa." John cut again, taking his handkerchief to his forehead. "Inside the house we keep everything strictly according to your wishes. Even the dust refrains from the audacity of falling where it pleases." He raised his steely eyes to his wife. "The garden should be left alone. Don't look at it. Don't think of it. Pretend it doesn't exist. Leave us a place where we can enjoy a tiny bit of freedom."

Millie could see her mother's knees shaking. Her composure cracked. "I am not a bad person, John Hammond! I am not!"

She ran out of the kitchen in tears, only followed only by John's tired sigh. Paralysed by shock, the children did not move until he rose from the chair saying, "Well, I'd better get back to work."

Everything was over so quickly that the man still hauled chunks of dead tree to his van when John slipped into his car and drove away as his children watched the ugly stumps left in the grass.

* * *

After that day, a strange silence took hold of the house. Millie could feel a tension trickling behind every carefully measured gesture, as if her parents were performing a silent dance. She could not name this feeling, but when she asked, Ryan had simply told her that she had not noticed it before, that was all. Maybe he was right, but she thought that there was more to it.

Cousin Jimmy went to his grandmother's house for the last weeks before school and Scruffy found a friend on another street, only showing up to eat and sleep. Ryan started spending more time with his school friends, playing ball in the park. Millie was alone.

After her father's outburst in the kitchen, she had felt a part of something. She, Ryan and John were the saviours of trees, they stood together against her mother and the evil gardener. Quickly she realized that it had only been a moment and that their father was as absent as ever. He worked all day, dined with them and then read on the porch in a flawless routine.

Their mother, however, became silent and bitter. Slow, almost imperceptible changes came about the house. One day lunch was slightly late, another, diner was slightly toasted. Beds were unmade until later in the morning, and now and then a fine layer of dust covered the furniture. Her mother now often relinquished her lipstick and her dresses looked somewhat crinkled. She would stay locked in her bedroom for hours, and rarely sung around the house any more. The garden became a taboo subject.

Soon school started, bringing a new routine and for sometime Millie was happy and distracted enough. Her mother had acquired the habit of running her hand through Millie's hair with a soft, distant smile. She never touched Ryan, though. Her brother would not allow it. Soon Millie because accustomed to the differences and almost forgot her mother's generous laughter of before, and the vitality she seemed to have lost. Another summer came, oppressive heat tempered by the cool shadow of the trees, and to Millie it felt like nothing had changed that much after all.

Now her mother stood in the porch, calling her name and waiting. When Millie came closer she said, "Your Aunt Cecilia is taking you to town. Wash up and put on a nice dress. She will be here in half-an-hour."

The prospect of an afternoon out with her favourite aunt gave wings to Millie's feet. Her aunt longed for a baby girl and pampered her to the fullest, often making Ryan and Jimmy jealous. Millie loved going out with her aunt even when they had to walk carrying bags under the sun.

This afternoon was no different from others. They bought lovely new shoes for Cecilia, had ice cream at Marco's, and then shopped for school clothes for Millie. The afternoon had brought heavy clouds and a suffocating humidity smothered them. They sought relief of a nice cool theatre, where 'Mary Poppins' was playing. When they left, a brisk summer rain awaited them. They ran to the car but they were soaked when they reached it.

Cecilia drove Millie back home and parked in the driveway. As soon as Millie stepped out of the car, she knew something was wrong: a poignant smell of freshly cut grass hit her. She ran to the garden, to find the mantle of wild semi-dry weeds replaced by a neatly cropped carpet with a few barren patches of dark wet earth showing. She relaxed. All twenty remaining trees still stood and the grass would grow back. Maybe now that it was trimmed she would find a bracelet lost in the previous summer.

She followed her aunt into the house, but when they called no one answered. Cecilia called again, her voice acquiring a concerned edge. Silence ensued.

"Stay here, darling," Cecilia told Millie.

Millie followed her nonetheless as she wandered through the house, calling softly, until she reached her sister's room. She knocked and called, but no answer came. Carefully, she pushed the door open. Marissa lay on the bed, perfectly dressed with her fiercest red lipstick on but no other colour tinged her face. Millie thought that she was asleep until she noticed the red stains in the bed cover.

She tried to run to her mother but Cecilia snapped and held her back, burying Millie's face in her stomach.

"Go out, dear," she said, her voice trembling as she gently pushed Millie out of the room.

Millie sat on the floor by the room, trying not to think. She could understand a part of what had happened but it made no sense. She heard Cecilia calling an ambulance, talking softly to her sister, sobbing. She wanted to join them in the room but she was too scared that it was true. A breeze coming from an open window carried that scent of wet dirt, summer rain and drying juices. Freshly cut grass, her mother's work.

* * *

Milena still thought of that day when the boy finished mowing. The rain had held off longer than she had expected but the smell, gods, the smell was like poisonous gas in the air. She sat, light-headed, feeling all the guilt hitting her full force.

"I was only ten, I couldn't have known it," she whispered half-heartedly.

"What was that, Mrs. Leigh?" the boy enquired politely.

Milena faked a polite smile. "Nothing."

She paid the boy and sat back in her chair. Her husband would be home soon. She prayed in thanks, feeling unworthy of her good fortune.

The smell held her a prisoner of memories. She should have understood or at least seen more. But she had been too busy running wild in the garden to notice that nothing had been fine, even before the trees were cut. She should have noticed how hard her mother tried to be perfect, harder than any other mother in the neighbourhood. Her father's benevolence... she should have noticed that it was little more than aloofness. His unwavering politeness to their mother was not the affection and appreciation that she craved; it was merely a way to hide his frustration at being trapped.

She could only imagine what her mother must have felt upon seeing her children lining up with her husband against her. Milena still thought that killing a tree was wrong, but ostracising their mother as they had, unwittingly in her case, intentionally in Ryan's, was too much of a punishment. They had never shown the slightest appreciation for all the little things she did to make their lives better.

Milena was a grown woman: time, and many conversations with her Aunt had changed her perspective on the events and had erased the anger she had felt then at her mother for leaving them. That morning had set the ruining of an illusion and yet she understood that the incident was not the cause of Marissa's depression, but rather a symptom. She knew that even if she had wanted, she would not have been able to stop Ryan from calling their father. She even understood that something else would cause an similarly revealing crisis.

In those days there was no Prozac or parent-blaming therapy to help people like her mother. Women had roles, they fulfilled them, that was it. Milena still felt angry at her father, at her brother, even at herself for the roles they had played. The grass smell always brought that back, as if Marissa stood dressed in her favourite red dress telling them all, "You will remember this forever."

But in her note, her mother had not been vengeful. She had only asked for forgiveness. And that hurt Milena the most.

 

 _Finis_  
August 2006


End file.
